Thank you to everyone who attended our
June User Group Leaders and Liaisons Meeting on June 22nd. And a HUGE thank you to our speakers:
@Marius Ciortea,
@Tim Bonnemann,
@Joseph Mahaz,
@Matt Passini,
@Vicki Miller,
@Laurel Dickson-Bull,
@DAVID Jenness, and
@Divya Koppolu! For anyone that couldn't attend here is the
link to the recording of the call (password: c#CB9EK*) and the link to the
slides.
We know events are often the lifeblood of any community. And whether you are with IBM or an external contributor (e.g., a leader of one of our many IBM user groups), we want your events to be successful in all aspects, so your community can thrive. We have a great resource called the
IBM Community Events Playbook which user groups leaders can use as an end-to-end guide on creating events in the community with the most common instructions and tips. The IBM Community Events Playbook is intended for Group Admins and Super Admins tasked with creating and managing events of all types on the IBM Community. It was created by the IBM Community team.
The User Group Leaders and Liaisons meetings occur bi-monthly and the June meeting was our 3rd User Group Leaders and Liaisons Meeting of 2022. Please see our
recap blog from the February 2022 User Group Leaders and Liaisons Kickoff.
@Joseph Mahaz, Airport Maximo User Group (AMUG),
@Matt Passini, IBM Champion & President of the Midwest User Group, and
@Vicki Miller, Principal Automation Technical Specialist, IBM Technology, US Financial Services Market facilitated a great discussion around takeaways and lessons learned from hosting in-person and virtual meetings in 2022 and shared some great tips:
- For in person events it's critical to send out save the date messages as soon as possible (give enough time for attendees to factor in travel authorization, budget, and procurement)
- Take the opportunity to promote upcoming events at the end of your current event
- Consistent communication (early and often) - stay in touch with members throughout the year and between events and ask for feedback from both users and sponsors (live or virtual surveys)
- It's helpful to coordinate a steering group for planning and execution of events and procuring sponsors
- Holding round tables at events can be a huge draw and take up limited pre-prep time
- Promotion tips: create a short video to share in a blog post or series of posts in the community sharing why members should attend the event and what they'll get out of it and communicate early, ideally at least 2 months prior to the event
@Laurel Dickson-Bull also shared an exciting announcement on IBM's renewed partnership with HCL including the biggest investment, the most features and changes, into the IBM DevOps products in a decade:
Below are the links to the recording and slides from all of the User Group Leaders and Liaisons Meetings this year:
Please be sure to mark your calendars for some of the great events we have coming up across the community: